A long-running debate in the small firms' literature questions the value of formal 'human resource management' (HRM) practices which have been linked to high performance in larger firms. We contribute to this literature by exploiting linked employer-employee surveys for 2004 and 2011. Using...

This paper compares labour productivity during the Great Depression (GD) and the Great Recession (GR) in engineering, metal working and allied industries. Throughout, it distinguishes between output per worker and output per hour. From the peak-to-trough of the GD cycle, hourly labour...

This paper provides estimates of labor productivity for one-third of UK manufacturing during the Great Depression. It covers engineering and allied industries, and metal working industries. A unique data set of actual hours of work is combined with comparable real output and employment...

Using the approach suggested by Gabaix (Econometrica 2011) this paper demonstrates that idiosyncratic shocks in the largest firms are important for an understanding of aggregate volatility in German manufacturing industries. The implications of this finding for theoretical and empirical research...

We study differences in the adjustment of aggregate real wages in the manufacturing sector over the business cycle across OECD countries, combining results from different data and dynamic methods. Summary measures of cyclicality show genuine cross-country heterogeneity even after controlling for...

This paper establishes stylized facts about the cyclicality of real consumer wages and real producer wages in Germany. As detrending methods we apply the deterministic trend model, the Beveridge-Nelson decomposition, the Hodrick-Prescott filter, the Baxter-King filter and the structural time...

This study investigates whether exposure to peer depression in adolescence affects own depression in adulthood. We find a significant long-term depression peer effect for females but not for males in a sample of U.S. adolescents who are followed into adulthood. An increase of one standard...

This paper analyzes how the labor market adjusts to the Great Recession. To this aim, we use the data for Latvia, a country that has experienced one of the most severe recessions in Europe and a subsequent remarkable recovery. Employing longitudinal EU SILC data and a panel data set constructed...

Das Geschäftsklima in der Gewerblichen Wirtschaft hat sich im März erneut eingetrübt. In Westdeutschland ereichten die Erwartungen mit einem Saldo von -10,7 Prozentpunkten den niedrigsten Wert seit April 1999. In den neuen Bundesländern kühlte sich das Klima ebenfalls weiter ab. Dies lässt...

Die Abkühlung des Geschäftsklimas in der Gewerblichen Wirtschaft hat sich im April fortgesetzt. In Westdeutschland fielen vor allem die Urteile zur aktuellen Lage schlechter aus als im Vormonat. In den neuen Bundesländern tendierten Lage und Erwartungen gleichermaßen nach unten: Der...